Daily Notes: Feat. Sunday’s Notable Call-Ups

Table of Contents
Here’s the table of contents for today’s edition of the Daily Notes.

1. Sunday’s Notable Call-Ups
2. Today’s MLB.TV Free Game
3. Today’s Complete Schedule

Sunday’s Notable Call-Ups
Introduction
Yesterday (Sunday) represented the first day of roster expansion in the league, a period which is often accompanied by a considerable number of promotions for minor leaguers. Below is a haphazardly constructed of four notable players recalled on the first day of September.

Player: Dellin Betances, RHP, New York AL (Link)
Stats: 84.0 IP, 11.57 K/9, 4.50 BB/9, 0.21 HR/9, 2.69 FIP at Triple-A
Notes: Formerly considered one the Yankees’ top prospects, Betances has been relegated to a relief role at this point — a capacity in which he’s flourished. After a difficult appearance in his major-league debut (box), Betances threw a reasonable third of an inning yesterday (box).

Player: Nick Castellanos, OF, Detroit (Link)
Stats: 595 PA, .276/.343/.450 (.307 BABIP) at Triple-A
Notes: Castellanos was ranked 21st overall on Marc Hulet’s top-100 prospect list this preseason, and at roughly the same place on Hulet’s midseason list. His line at Toledo — not just the slash stats, but also the walk and strikeout ratios (9.1% BB, 16.8% K) — is entirely impressive for a 21-year-old at Triple-A.

Player: Michael Choice, OF, Oakland (Link)
Stats: 600 PA, .302/.390/.445 (.358 BABIP) at Triple-A
Notes: Selected 10th overall by Oakland in 2010 out of UT-Arlington, Choice has demonstrated an excellent combination of power and control of the strike zone over his minor-league career. Historically a center fielder, the 23-year-old has played all three outfield positions about equally in 2013 with Sacramento.

Player: J.R. Murphy, C, New York AL (Link)
Stats: 257 PA, .270/.342/.430 (.304 BABIP) at Triple-A
Notes: Absent from preseason prospect lists, the 22-year-old Murphy demonstrated excellent control of the plate both at Double- and Triple-A, recording walk and strikeout rates of 10.0% and 15.6%, respectively. After playing a bit of third base previously, Murphy has focused on catcher exclusively this season.

Today’s MLB.TV Free Game
San Francisco at San Diego | 15:40 ET
Barry Zito (124.0 IP, 128 xFIP-, -0.5 WAR) faces Ian Kennedy (153.2 IP, 116 xFIP-, 0.4 WAR). The crowd going wild may or may not be the sound one hears.

Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: San Francisco Radio or Television.

Today’s Complete Schedule
Here’s the complete schedule for all of today’s games, with our very proprietary watchability (NERD) scores for each one. Pitching probables and game times aggregated from MLB.com and RotoWire. The average NERD Game Score for today is 5.5.

Note: the following table is entirely sortable.

Away		SP	Tm.	Gm.	Tm.	SP		Home	Time
Jose Quintana	CHA	5	1	4	2	5	NYA	Phil Hughes	13:05
D. Matsuzaka*	NYN	5	7	5	8	4	ATL	Paul Maholm	13:10
A. Wainwright	STL	9	3	7	3	8	CIN	Mat Latos	13:10
Doug Fister	DET	7	7	7	9	7	BOS	John Lackey	13:35
Andrew Albers	MIN	3	3	3	4	3	HOU	Paul Clemens*	14:10
Charlie Morton	PIT	6	6	5	3	3	MIL	T. Thornburg*	14:10
F. Hernandez	SEA	9	4	8	9	8	KC	Danny Duffy*	14:10
H. Alvarez	MIA	6	1	4	4	3	CHN	Travis Wood	14:20
Barry Zito	SF	3	4	3	5	3	SD	Ian Kennedy	15:40
Bud Norris	BAL	3	9	6	7	8	CLE	J. Masterson	16:05
Derek Holland	TEX	8	4	6	7	5	OAK	Dan Straily	16:05
C. Kershaw	LAN	10	4	6	7	2	COL	Chad Bettis	16:10
Esmil Rogers	TOR	5	5	5	3	6	AZ	B. McCarthy	16:10
St. Strasburg	WAS	10	3	7	0	8	PHI	Cole Hamels	19:05
Chris Archer	TB	5	10	7	8	8	LAA	G. Richards	21:05

To learn how Pitcher and Team NERD Scores are calculated, click here.
To learn how Game NERD Scores are calculated, click here.
* = Fewer than 20 IP, NERD at discretion of very handsome author.